The 17t o August is the 229t day o the year (230t in lowp years) in the Gregorian Calendar, wi 136 days bidin.
Events 1771: Ben Nevis 1945 : Sukarno reads oot Indonesie 's declaration o unthirldom1999 : Damage efter the Izmit yirdquauk in Turkey 1424 - Hunder Years' War : An Inglis airmy defeats a French airmy in the Battle o Vernieul in Normandy .
1560 - Protestantism becomes the offeecial releegion o Scotland .
1689 - A major yirdquauk hits Anatolie in present-day Turkey .
1740 - Pape Benedict XIV is electit.
1771 - Edinburgh chemist James Robertson becomes the first-recordit person tae climb Ben Nevis , the heichest peak in Scotland an the present-day Unitit Kinrick .
1786 - Frederick William II o Proushie ascends the throne on the daith o his faither.
1942 - Warld War II : The Unitit States ' first firebombin raid in Europe taks place.
1943 - Warld War II : The Allied conquest o Sicily is completit.
1945 - Sukarno declares the unthirldom o Indonesie , which is nae recognisit bi the Netherlands until 1949.
1960 - Gabon gains unthirldom frae Fraunce .
1970 - The Soviet Union 's Venera 7 spacecraft is sent tae the planet Venus .
1977 - The Soviet icebreaker "Arktika" becomes the first surface-ship tae reach the North Pole.
1982 - The first CDs are released tae the public in Wast Germany.
1987 - Rudolf Hess commits suicide at Spandau Prison.
1988 - Pakistani Preses Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq is kilt in a plane crash near Bahawalpur, Punjab, Pakistan .
1998 - US Preses Bill Clinton admits tae an affair wi White Hoose intern Monica Lewinsky.
1999 - Izmit , Northwastren Turkey , is strack bi a magnitude 7.4 yirdquauk, killin an estimatit ower 40,000 fowk.
2002 - The River Elbe reaches its heichest-recordit level durin the Central European floods o 2002 .
2008 - Soummer Michael Phelps achieves a total o 8 gowd medals at a single Olympic Gemmes .
2015 - A bomb splodes at Ratchaprasong Intersection, near Bangkok 's Erawan Shrine, killin 23 fowk.
2017 - 2017 Barcelona attack: A vehicle is driven at pedestrians in Las Ramblas, Barcelona , killin 13 fowk in a terrorist attack. A later attack in the nearby toun o Cambrils results in the daiths o ane bystander an 5 attackers.
2019 - A bomb attack on a weddin pairty in Kabul , Afghanistan , kills at least 63 fowk an wounds 180; the self-proclaimed Islamic State group claim responsibility.
Births Tarja Turunen Rachel Corsie 1629 - John III Sobieski , King o Poland an Grand Duke o Lithuanie (d. 1696)
1786 - Davy Crockett, American poleetical figur (d. 1836)
1786 - Princess Victoria o Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld (d. 1861)
1844 - Menelik II, Emperor o Ethiopie (d. 1913 )
1887 - Charles I o Austrick (d. 1922 )
1887 - Marcus Garvey, Jamaican-American poleetical activist (d. 1940 )
1893 - Mae West, American actress (d. 1980)
1906 - Marcelo Caetano , Portuguese politeecian (d. 1980)
1911 - Mikhail Botvinnik, Roushie chess player (d. 1995 )
1913 - Mark Felt, American FBI agent (d. 2008 )
1920 - Maureen O'Hara, Erse-American actress (d. 2015)
1926 - Jiang Zemin , umwhile Preses o the Fowkrepublic o Cheenae
1932 - V. S. Naipaul , Trinidadian-Breetish writer (d. 2018)
1943 - Robert De Niro , American actor
1944 - Bobby Murdoch, Scots fitbawer (d. 2001 )
1951 - Sandra White , Scots politeecian
1952 - Nelson Piquet, Brazilian racin driver
1953 - Herta Müller , Romanie-German writer
1960 - Sean Penn , American actor, filmmaker an activist
1970 - Jim Courier, American tennis player
1977 - Tarja Turunen , Finnish sangster
1977 - Thierry Henry , French fitbawer
1977 - William Gallas, French fitbawer
1979 - Simon Taylor, Scots rugby union player
1982 - Phil Jagielka, Inglis fitbawer
1986 - Marcus Berg , Swadish fitbawer
1989 - Rachel Corsie, Scots fitbawer
Daiths 1424 - John Stewart, Yerl o Buchan, Scots nobleman (b. 1381)
1424 - Archibald Douglas, 4t Yerl o Douglas, Scots nobleman an warlaird (b. 1372)
1786 - Frederick the Great , King o Proushie (b. 1712)
1831 - Patrick Nasmyth, Scots penter (b. 1787)
1850 - José de San Martín , Argentine statesman (b. 1778)
1868 - Duncan Forbes, Scots linguist (b. 1798)
1899 - William Simpson, Scots airtist (b. 1823)
1916 - Umberto Boccioni, Italian penter (b. 1882)
1946 - Robert Younger, Baron Blanesburgh, Scots barrister an juidge (b. 1861)
1969 - Ludwig Mies van der Rohe , German-American airchitect (b. 1886)
1969 - Otto Stern , German pheesicist (b. 1888)
1987 - Rudolf Hess, Nazi politeecian (b. 1894 )
1988 - Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq , Preses o Pakistan (b. 1924 )
2010 - Francesco Cossiga , Preses o Italy (b. 1928 )
2010 - Edwin Morgan , Scots Makar (b. 1920 )
2014 - Sammy Conn, Scots fitbawer (b. 1961)
2015 - Yvonne Craig, American actress (b. 1937 )
2016 - Arthur Hiller , Canadian-American film director (b. 1923 )
Halidays Banner o Gabon
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